


L Is For Lestrade [A Scotland Yard Detective's Memoirs]

by mydogwatson



Series: A Baker Street Alphabet [12]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Friendship, M/M, Marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-28
Updated: 2013-10-28
Packaged: 2017-12-30 18:54:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1022221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mydogwatson/pseuds/mydogwatson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An old copper remembers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	L Is For Lestrade [A Scotland Yard Detective's Memoirs]

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a snippet, really, but once I had the notion it demanded to be written.
> 
> Also, I am a little late posting today, so sorry about that. My day job got in the way. Well, I say "job", although no one is paying me to write a novel. One lives in hope, however!

A policeman’s lot is not a happy one.  
-W.S. Gilbert

 

Although I certainly hope that whatever readers this modest publication might acquire will enjoy the entire book, I am very aware that most of the interest in these memories is because of my long association with the famous Consulting Detective, Sherlock Holmes. While that knowledge might bruise an ordinary ego, I accept it cheerfully, mainly because so much time spent with Holmes served to eradicate any ego I originally had.

Sherlock Holmes is a brilliant man and I was honoured to work with him and even to consider him [on some days anyway] a friend.

I do not intend to relate again the details of our first meeting and those unhappy days when drugs nearly ended his life before it really began. Those details have been aired and rehashed many times. Everyone knows that he cleaned himself up and began the years of work that have brought him such fame.

Instead I will begin this chapter with the moment that would make Sherlock into the great and good man he later became. That was the moment he met Doctor John Watson.

I am a little embarrassed to admit that the first time I saw John, I simply disregarded him as having no importance. He was only a stranger sitting in Sherlock’s new flat, no more significant than the third person in the room, a fluttering landlady. [And it must be added that the estimable Mrs. Hudson was no minor figure in the years that followed either.]

It was a surprise, a short time later, when Sherlock actually brought John along to the crime scene [This was the infamous Study In Pink case.] Such a thing had never happened before and I did not really know what to make of it, even as he had John put on the crime scene coveralls. When I naturally asked who this man was, all Sherlock did was snap, “He’s with me.” And so he was.

Also unprecedented was the way he actually consulted with John and listened to what he had to say. It did not especially surprise me that John seemed dazzled by the usual Holmesian theatrics and couldn’t seem to stop praising Sherlock. “Amazing” and “brilliant” were thrown around with abandon. I just figured he hadn’t known Sherlock long enough to realise that for other people the brilliance was eventually outweighed by the aggravation caused by the man’s abrasive and frankly obnoxious personality.  
Of course, all these years later, John Watson still hasn’t reached that point. Which is pretty amazing as well.

Later that same night I saw an entirely new and shocking side of Sherlock when it became clear that he was already using John as his moral compass. I was frankly astonished, as I had never realised that Sherlock even knew what a moral compass was, never mind being aware that he didn’t have one before that night. Now he had that compass and it never led him astray.

It did not take me long to realise that Watson needed Holmes just as much. More than once over the years the good doctor has told me how much their friendship changed his life.

In all those years, John has been many things to Sherlock---flatmate, partner, friend and blogger, husband. But always, John was the keeper of the soul belonging to a man many people thought didn’t even have one. Perhaps that soul burns so brightly that most people can’t bear to look at it. John looked and then he stayed. Those words are much too poetic for a man like me, but it is how I see it.

Of course, the biggest regret of my entire career was the way I let Sherlock down over the whole James Moriarty affair. [The case itself is discussed fully in Chapter 11.] I let doubt creep in and, as Sherlock said, once you let that doubt in, it is difficult to get it out.

John never doubted, not at the beginning, not for the entire time Sherlock was thought to be dead. 

Once the truth was revealed and Sherlock was back, the true glory years of their partnership began. Holmes and Watson will live on, both for the work they have done together, and for the proof of what love can do. It can make a great man good and a lonely man happy.

Even a simple copper can understand that.

fini


End file.
